/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
“You can barely open a paper today or read the news on the internet without hearing about the opioid crisis that is impacting our country on a nationwide basis,” said Jason Moore, deputy attorney with Navajo County, as he introduced to the Board of Supervisors at the Jan. 22 meeting the consideration of retaining the law firm of Keller Rohrback to represent the county in potential litigation against opioid manufacturers and distributors in the multi-district litigation pending in federal court in the State of Ohio.
/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
In an effort to recover the costs that have incurred from the increased burden and strain on the criminal justice system among other things, the county decided late last summer to put out a Request for Qualifications in an effort to find an outside firm that would represent them in the opioid litigation.
/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
Three firms responded and the selection committee chose Keller Rohrback as the firm that was best able to represent the county’s interest in this matter, while being the most cost effective. Moore introduced Attorney Ron Kilgard as “the local face of the firm who will be communicating with us directly.”
/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
As a Phoenix native with 35 years of civil litigation, Kilgard briefly stated some of the more notable cases he has worked on in the past, including Volkswagen, Exxon and Enron. “Well over a thousand government entities throughout the United States are involved in this opioid litigation,” said Kilgard, “Including the states themselves.”
/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
Kilgard went on to assure the board that the firm is representing the county on a contingency fee basis and the costs of litigation advanced by the firm will only be recovered in the event of a successful recovery by the county.
/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
“This opioid litigation is our largest engagement as a firm,” continued Kilgard, noting that they are representing Maricopa, Mojave and Cochise counties as well as the City of Kingman. “Opioids have created major social problems that for some reason cannot be addressed by the representative and legislative branches of government.”
/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
One of the big problems with opioids is that they have been mismarketed, with the risks of long-term addiction being seriously overlooked and underestimated by the doctors, which is partly a result of the marketing that has gone on with these drugs.
/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
The cases are filed all over the country into the federal court system, where they are then consolidated by a judicial panel that sends the cases to one judge, U.S. District Judge Dan Polster in Ohio. The judge then organizes the cases into groups, like counties, cities, Indian tribes, etc. Kilgard said that the first group of cases is set to go to trial in the State of Ohio in September.
/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
“This is not a class action lawsuit,” continued Kilgard. “We are only representing Navajo County for Navajo County interests, which are the same for the other counties.”
/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
While there are currently no official statistics on the total number of opioid cases within the county or the costs associated with those cases, it was later noted that collecting and analyzing the stats and time spent on opioid cases is part of the process that the county will begin performing with the assistance of the firm.
/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
“I can tell you as an attorney that it is a local problem and it is real,” continued Moore. “When we talk to people in drug court about their addiction and how it is that they got started on drugs, how the addiction progressed over time and how they got hooked on heroin; almost to a person, it started with prescription opioid pain killers. Listening to National Public Radio earlier this week, in a discussion it was noted that if you are an adult in America, you are more likely to die from opioid overdose rather than a car accident.”
/wp:paragraph
wp:paragraph
The board unanimously approved the motion to retain Keller and Rohrback as well as allowing County Attorney Brad Carlyon to sign the retainer every month under the terms that were presented.
/wp:paragraph
